


Invasive Paperwork

by BerryBagel



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Everyone Is Alive, F/M, Fluff, Humor, Post-Endgame, Secret Relationship, this is the best possible timeline where everything in infinity war gets undone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-11
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2020-01-11 08:28:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18426819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BerryBagel/pseuds/BerryBagel
Summary: Everyone knows Natasha and Sam are close friends.  There's no reason for anyone to need to know the specifics of exactly how close.





	Invasive Paperwork

It’s 7 AM, Saturday morning.  Steve and Natasha are both in Sam’s kitchen.  Steve is in the kitchen because he always meets Sam for breakfast after his morning run.  Natasha is in the kitchen because she’s staying with Sam while her apartment gets renovated.  And also because she’s been sleeping with Sam for the past three months.

 

Steve doesn’t know about that yet, somehow.  Natasha is sitting across the table from him, wearing Sam’s shirt with no pants.  There was something of a scramble for clothing when the doorbell rang a few minutes ago.

 

Sam is in the shower now, and in his absence, Steve has decided to get the jump on breakfast.  Steve pours half a box of Cheerios into a mixing bowl, and gets up to rummage through the fridge for milk.

 

“Pass me the orange juice?” She asks.  Steve makes a face.

 

“You don’t want Sam’s orange juice,” Steve says, “He drinks it straight out of the bottle.  Who knows where his mouth’s been?”

 

Natasha knows  _ exactly _ where Sam’s mouth has been.  But she does appreciate the warning on backwash orange juice.

 

* * *

 

After the whole Thanos event, there was a while where things just kinda went nuts.  Everyone was alive again, everyone was celebrating. Everyone was doing things in the spur of the moment.  So, yeah, there was a point where Natasha and Sam slept together, and they didn’t think anything was going to come of it.  They were still hyped up on adrenaline, and hunky-dory the-team-is-back-together-again endorphins. There was no reason to mention it to anyone.

 

Again, Natasha cannot overemphasize the amount of celebratory sex everyone was having.  She and Sam were - _ and still are, _ for that matter- good friends.  Sometimes you have no-strings-attached mutually satisfying sex with your good friends, and everyone involved can be mature grownups about it.  No need to ever address it or let it affect your job, and certainly no reason to tell the team about it.

 

So, yes, the first time was during that visit to Wakanda.  They agreed it was great, fantastic even, but that was that.  And it was, until a few days later, when they had the Quinjet to themselves for a few hours.  Then again a few weeks later when the war criminal charges got dropped and they were feeling celebratory.  Then there was a whole week full of awards ceremonies, and what can Natasha say, she and Sam both look  _ excellent _ in formal attire.

 

Natasha is technically staying in Sam’s guest room.  That’s how she’s rationalizing it to herself, anyways.  The word ‘guest’ is key. Otherwise the whole situation starts to feel a bit like moving in together, and that’s obviously an unwarranted level of intimacy.

 

Sam isn’t really a cuddler, and neither is Natasha, so that works out perfectly.  It’s more convenient if they both sleep in the same bed, is all. Sam isn’t about to make Natasha do a walk of shame down the hallway.  That’d be ridiculous. Sometimes during the night he’ll drape an arm around her waist, and that’s reasonable. Normal creature comforts.  It probably makes him feel safer to hold her. Natasha also feels safer, so she can appreciate that.

 

Sam wakes up after her.  He likes to heckle Natasha about her morning breath, so she makes sure to kick off the day with a big open-mouthed kiss.  He mumbles something about her being gross, but he drinks orange juice straight out of the bottle, so what does he know?

 

* * *

 

There’s expected to be an assassination attempt on a senator at the gala.  Natasha and the team have, accordingly, been sent to the gala in the interest of the senator  _ not _ being assassinated.

 

Usually Natasha is on the other side of this sort of thing, and it’s undeniably easier to carry out a hit than to prevent one.  She had been advocating for a ‘the best defense is a strong offense’ strategy, but Fury had other ideas, so she’s out here in an evening gown.

 

Sam is also unrecognizable enough for undercover work.  He’s here as her assigned date for the evening. Steve and Bucky, meanwhile, couldn’t be subtle in a formal event if their lives depended on it.  They’re up in the control room running surveillance, prepared to leap into action if given the signal.

 

They’re connected to the control room by mic, which is of course always used responsibly

 

“Sam, do you remember that commercial for that hamburger place...it had the catchy jingle? How’d it go?” Steve asks, then helpfully hums something completely indistinguishable.

 

“No, Steve, that’s not it.” Bucky’s voice cuts in.  “It was more like…” More humming.

 

The senator and his wife take to the dance floor, so Sam and Natasha follow suit.  It’s a slow song. This isn’t a professional ballroom crowd, so most of the dancers are just holding each other and swaying to the music.  It’s distinctly harder to sway to the music when there are hamburger jingles being hummed directly into their eardrums, but they make do.

 

A solid 80% of Natasha’s work is acting sexy, and she does good work.  It isn’t hard to smile sweetly and not step on Sam’s feet. It is fun, though.  The song ends, and they stay arm-in-arm for a very nice several additional seconds.

 

“You two are great at this undercover stuff.  That was super convincing.” Steve tells them.

 

* * *

 

They get back to Sam’s house, and Natasha is about ready to peel her dress off and put on some sweatpants.  Sam has other ideas. He spends a few minutes rummaging around for his bluetooth speaker, and dims the lights in the living room.

 

“I feel like we need a repeat of that dance.” He explains.

 

“Different music.” Natasha notes.  Sam loves his 70’s power ballads.

 

“Yeah, sorry, I don’t have the Burger King commercial music on my playlist.” Sam says.

 

Natasha knows ten kinds of ballroom dance, and strictly speaking, this is none of them.  In fact, she has the growing suspicion that Sam doesn’t have any formal dance training.

 

But this time, no one is listening in.  There’s no risk of anyone pulling a gun at any point during the dance, or lunging in with a knife, or arming a bomb.  They’re well and truly off the clock. It’s just them, rocking slightly out of time to a synthesized guitar solo.

 

* * *

 

Even if Natasha and Sam  _ were _ in a relationship, telling anyone would be an obvious mistake.  Steve and Bucky got engaged, and Fury made them fill out honest-to-God  _ paperwork _ about it.  Now there’s a form out there somewhere with all the intimate details of the supersoldiers’ personal lives.  That’s no way to live. What if they broke up? Would they have to fill out  _ more _ paperwork about it?  No, thank-you.

 

Thor doesn’t have to fill out paperwork, and if he doesn’t have to, why should Natasha and Sam?  She knows what’s going on between them, and Sam knows, so why should anyone else know?

 

At any rate, she mostly knows what’s going on between them, and Sam probably more-or-less knows.  The renovations on her apartment have been done for a few weeks now, but she hasn’t moved back yet.  Yesterday Sam called her  _ babe _ , just to see how it’d feel.  He said it felt weird, and he’s probably not going to do it again, but it was nevertheless a thing that very much happened.

 

* * *

 

Natasha has always felt a sort of perverse pleasure at being part of the Captain America team.  It’s pretty much the strongest symbolic  _ fuck you _ to the Red Room that she can imagine.  Not only is she an Avenger, she’s working directly adjacent to the guy decked out in stars and stripes.  She liked Steve’s suit, in theory. In actuality, yeah, it was a little ridiculous looking. No amount of well-intentioned fashion advice was going to get Steve to redesign that helmet.  They were probably just lucky he wasn’t still wearing the cowl.

 

Now Steve’s ‘retiring’.  Steve has never taken a day off in his life, and Natasha gives it two weeks before he’s back in business on some high-stakes top-secret mission, but it’s a nice thought.  Maybe he really is throwing in the towel for good. If anyone deserves to spend some relaxing time farming goats with their fiancé, Steve does.

 

As such, the title of  _ Captain America _ is being passed down.  It’s not as highly coveted as initially suspected.  They were thinking maybe they could get Sharon to take it, but she apparently isn’t interesting in painting a literal target onto herself.  The other Avengers have all been cultivating their own less dorky public personas.

 

Fury has Sam trying on the uniform, trying to warm him up to the idea.  Natasha is tagging along with Fury, hoping to get in some light mockery at the expense of Sam having to wear a cobalt blue helmet.

 

Unfortunately, the helmet has been toned down somewhat.  It’s a navy blue color, and not monogrammed. The whole suit looks more subdued.  Even the iconic star on the chest had to be reconfigured to work with the falcon armor.

 

Sam is complaining about arm mobility.  Whoever was resizing the suit underestimated Sam’s bicep circumference.  It fits well otherwise. Natasha has to admit Fury might be onto something here.  There may be something to this  _ Sam as Captain America _ concept.

 

She’s not sure if this is a sight that inspires  _ patriotism _ , per say, but the second Fury leaves she’s gonna take that suit off with her teeth.

 

* * *

Natasha gets home, and Sam is in the kitchen.

 

(Not  _ home _ , Sam’s house.  But Wanda is subletting Natasha’s old apartment.  So fuck it, this  _ is _ home now.)

 

“Hey, do you have a phone that isn’t a burner?” Sam asks.  He’s writing something down on paper embossed with the Avengers letterhead.

 

Sam is...doing paperwork?  She stares at him in disbelief until he looks up.

 

“What?” He asks.

 

“You want everyone to know about our personal lives?” Natasha says.

 

Sam returns her look of disbelief.  “This is an emergency contact form. Do you not have emergency contacts?”

 

Well, no.

 

“Thor doesn’t have to have emergency contacts.” Natasha grumbles.

 

“Alright, good thing I’m not dating Thor.  If anything bad happened to you, I’d want to know, so I could be there.” Sam says.  “I’m filling out this form because I assume you feel the same way.”

 

“Thanks.  You’re a good friend.” It’s not exactly the right thing to say, but Natasha is hoping it’s close enough.

 

“Yeah, nice try, but there’s a line here asking me the nature of our relationship, and I’m not putting  _ friend _ .” Sam says.

 

Natasha rolls her eyes.  “I do feel the same way. I’ll do the form.”

 

It’s not exactly going public.  It’s just an admission that Natasha cares about Sam.  That shouldn’t be hard to admit to people. In fact, Natasha wants people to know.  More than that, she wants Sam to know. If he’s ever hurt, or ever needs her help, she’s going to be there, and she’s going to be there because she loves him.

 

“I’m gonna draw little hearts around your name.” Sam says, grinning.

 

“Don’t you dare.”


End file.
